“[The bull that broke Lovett’s leg] is not a bad character, although I don’t hang out with him. The old guy wasn’t being mean; he was just being territorial.”Lyle Lovett

DESPITE snagging three of his four Grammys in country categories, Nashville has never really understood Lyle Lovett, the tall Texan with the “Eraserhead” hair.

Part of the problem for traditionalists is that Lovett doesn’t always twang.

His music is influenced by the late great Texas troubadour Townes Van Zandt, but it also borrows from jazz, swing, country, gospel and folk with subversive lyrics that often take the road more twisted.

Lovett, 45, may not have rock-star looks, but he’s got a brilliant mind and a knack for writing lyrics that are sometimes ironic and always witty. His songs will either leave you smiling or feeling disturbed by dark situations and characters painted with his distinctive deadpan delivery.

He’s not unfamiliar with Hollywood -the ex-husband of Julia Roberts (he’s now engaged to longtime girlfriend April Kimble), he’s also an actor of note who has appeared in many of director Robert Altman’s pictures.

These days, the singer is spending his time in the studio recording new songs for a late summer release, but on Tuesday he’ll drop “Smile,” a retrospective of the music he’s created for the movies since 1992.

It is a very pretty, simple album that’s highlighted by his Oscar-nominated duet with Randy Newman, “You’ve Got a Friend” from “Toy Story.”

Lovett will perform selections from “Smile” side-by-side with his best-known material on the season premiere of the PBS series “SoundStage” (which airs nationally on Tuesday).

Post: Why make an album of your movie music now?

Lovett: I always have a compulsion to organize my work, but I broke my leg last year and I was laying around thinking, “How can I be productive?” That’s how this record came about.

Lovett: The two of us were out on the family farm, surveying what had to get done. We were in this bull’s pen for 15 minutes looking at a tree when we were both charged by this animal. I didn’t save my uncle – we were helping each other.

Post: Your uncle tells it that you saved him.

Lovett: We were just trying to get out of the pen.

Post: Texas papers said the bull was your pet named Cotton.

Lovett: We run a farm and we have lots of animals. He is one of the bulls we raised on the farm, but a bull is not a pet – they don’t come in the house. I laughed when I read some of the stuff that described him like he was a dog or a cat.

Post: The bull charged you and caught your leg on a fence, shattering your shin-bone. How do you feel now?

Lovett: I’m much better, but I’m still not 100 percent. I’m still working on it. I’m really so grateful because it all could have been much, much worse than it was. I want to say [the bull] is not a bad character, although I don’t hang out with him. The old guy wasn’t being mean; he was just being territorial.

Post: Is there a song here?

Lovett: There’s always that possibility, but for the most part songs don’t come from obvious events like that for me. I say that to say, I don’t know where songs come from. I don’t know what makes me make something up in one way and not in another way.

Post: Is it really a mystery to you?

Lovett: It’s like things make themselves known to me. Songs of mine that I’m most happy with feel as if they were discovered and not thought about or made up. It’s a strange thing. If more songwriters understood it, there would be lots more good songs.

Post: Who do you really admire?

Lovett: Songwriters who can write a song for a certain occasion. I’ll watch TV and hear some really great jingles these days. I don’t know if I could do the same if someone gave me that assignment. It’s all about clarity, about connecting with the audience.

Post: People who see you in concert say after they have seen you perform, they feel like they know you.

Lovett: That’s nice. I think when a person does his own songs it’s a chance to say what you really think – and if not what you really think, than how you really feel. It’s an incredible opportunity that the audience gives you to be yourself. If people listen to my songs they come from a place that is real – it’s not as much imagination as it is reporting.

Post: But you do have an off-beat point of view.

Lovett: I don’t think I look for an off-beat point of view. It’s more like I say things that other people only think. If someone is drawn to a song it isn’t because they’re interested in me, but because the song spoke to them.

Post: Earlier when you were talking about making “Smile,” you said you liked organizing things. Is that just musically or in all aspects of life?

Lovett: I’m fairly compulsive about organizing things in my life.

Post: So are all four of your Grammys on the mantle, or are they scattered about the house as doorstops?

Lovett: Actually at my house I do have doorstops, because the house is so old the doors get caught in the wind, but I’ll leave the Grammy part up to your imagination.

Post: As a former journalist, you must know all the tricks we use to make people say what they don’t want to.